


Add on to Old Tides

by Superbanana



Category: Call the Midwife
Genre: Add on to old tides, Angst, F/F, Hurt, One Shot, Quick brain vomit, back story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-09
Updated: 2018-06-16
Packaged: 2018-12-25 15:52:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12039204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Superbanana/pseuds/Superbanana
Summary: Just a little explanation of how Patsy and Val ended up doing what their doing. Not reams of plot but its good to get it down.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Since Sharon asked...
> 
> Yes, apparently I do requests now

Val was the wife of Phil Dyer.

That was all she was really known as. A human being relegated to an add on to someone more important.

Someone bigger.

_-Val is demanding, always demanding when she comes to Patsys house. She says what she wants and Patsy is helpless to refuse. Helpless to say_

_'Stop. Tell me something I don't know about you."_

_Val is a rainforest; all secret lives played out in eyeless canopy._

-Val came to the station sometimes, dropped off lunches, took sympathetic lusts from the way some of the staff eyed her as she walked through the office.

She wore tight black jeans that curved to her backside and she ringed her eyes with enough makeup people could politely ignore that the bags showed how very tired she was underneath it all.

_-Val is ripping open her shirt so that the buttons go everywhere and Patsy is pulling her closer feeling the cold chill where Vals skin has been bared to the air._

_She smells like stale tea. Tastes like salt. Tastes like the sea. Tastes like tears._

-Phil cheated. A lot. Everyone knew it. Val is part of that Everyone that Knew though she wished she wasn't. She was sad inside.

Patsy watched her sometimes, wondered if their demons were matched enough to play nicely.

_-Val is pushing her down on her bed and dragging at her hand so that its positioned where Val needs it, riding her like a demon._

_It_ _would be beautiful if it wasn't scary. Vals teeth are pressed so tightly together they could shatter any minute and Patsy can't breath because it hurts to see how lost Val is._

_It seems almost a backward thought to mention how little this is all working for Patsy. This isn't what Patsy wanted when this started... But Patsy isn't really the player in this game she knows. She's just the board the games being played out on._

-It was a drizzly February evening when Val had ventured in looking for her husband. Phil wasn't there.

Phil never was but Patsy was. Patsy was there.

Their eyes locked as the pretty black makeup smudges and weeps down Vals pale cheeks.

_-Vals got to where she wants to be and it couldn't be plainer that she doesn't care if Patsys with her or not. Her nails are carving inches deep etchings into Patsys neck like she wants to kill her, like she hates Patsy._

_Patsy just pushes in deeper, wanting it to end so Val can go and leave her alone. Or maybe she might stay which would be even more terrifying._

\- It had started with flirting. Both of them fumbling out into this unconsidered avenue.

The possibilities open up; all inviting and inevitable and Patsy wonders what it would be like to wake up with someone more than once. Wonders what it would be like to have someone who knew her shoe size and the way she drinks her coffee and liked listening to vinyl on the sofa.

Val's unhappy, desperate for some love and Patsy is old enough now to realise she wants something more. If she saves someone properly for once could she be enough to keep for longer than a night?

_-Val is sweating, she's pressing her body down so their skin slides like parallel rails. Patsys chest is killing and Val won't kiss her and Patsy wants... Something she doesn't know how to name without feeling like an idiot._

_Val doesn't touch her back. That's not what this is about. Patsy is just the game._

_Patsy is just her game._

-The first time, Patsy had tried to be soft, questing for something that she thinks might be here. Val tells her to be harder. Turns Patsys kisses to bites and draws blood and Patsy feels like she's falling for someone who is possibly far more damaged than she is.

This is a hitherto unconsidered possibility.

_-Val is already leaving. Throwing on her dress and locking back into being Phil Dyers wife._

_She's gone before Patsy can muster strength to consider all the questions she has. All the requests she has for herself._

-The day after the first time Patsy had expected a call, had thought, idiotically, Val might turn up with bags.

She'd waited all day teasing her nails with her teeth nervously. Unsure and purposefully unpurposeful.

It had been almost a month until they spoke again. Val had turned up and demanded again a peice of Patsys tarnished soul.

And she'd given it.

One day someone was going to turn up who Patsy could be enough for... For now, there was Val.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> —— For Catching Up and anyone else who wanted to read this.
> 
>  
> 
> But you were history with the slamming of the door   
> And I made myself so strong again somehow   
> And I never wasted any of my time on you since then  
> But if I touch you like this   
> And if you kiss me like that   
> It was so long ago but it's all coming back to me   
> If you touch me like this   
> And if I kiss you like that   
> It was gone with the wind   
> But it's all coming back to me   
> (It's all coming back, it's all coming back to me now)  
> There were moments of gold   
> And there were flashes of light   
> There were things we'd never do again   
> But then they'd always seemed right   
> There were nights of endless pleasure   
> It was more than all your laws allow   
> Baby, baby, baby
> 
> Celine Dion- it’s all coming back to me now.
> 
> So many song possibilities for these two although I think the one I picked is pretty perfect for this chapter. An alternative would have to be groovy kind of love by Phil Collins though.

Wanton. 

Strangely that was always the word Helens mother had muttered whenever Phyllis was mentioned in conversation growing up. Wanton or, on a more strenuous day, That bastard girl. 

Bastard. 

It was odd really that Mary Shipman be so confined to these two statements regarding the quiet, curly haired girl who had befriended a teenage Helen despite her social standing, her dark looks, her lack of father. You’d think a mother would be pleased that her child had made friends in such an unfriendly environment, but then again, Mary had never truly been comfortable with Helens choices in anything really. Perhaps she’d seen more in their innocent show of hand holding. Perhaps she’d guessed far more than Helen or Phyllis had ever credited her with.

Bastard. 

Well, it had been true of course. Phyllis had certainly been illegitimate; her father some faceless man passed in a crowd forever unknown. Helen, at least, had been spared this focus on her character as to whether she’d been legitimate or not mainly because it wouldn’t have made any difference to her. In that time, in that place, all half caste kids were bastards in a strangers eyes. 

Bastard.

Phyllis had been simply perfection in Helens estimation even before anything had happened. Not wanton. Not quite wanton exactly. Keen maybe. Definitely excitable.

She’d always been a clever girl; a grammar school student with a crisp white blouse done up all the way to the top of her sharply ironed collar. Sometimes, when the fancy hit her, Helen could close her eyes and still see the girl Phyllis had been; her long curly hair drifting down her back and her wide, smiling mouth as she peached a stick of gum from one of the boys at the bus stop. Helen used to like watching Phyllis, liked the movement of her legs under her strictly monochromatic skirt, the dainty curve of her jaw. Her steadfast gaze that made Helen blush even when she couldn’t understand why.

Helen had been clever too though no one had ever bothered to validate that at the time; she’d managed to track down her eleven plus exam papers much later on and found her score, she couldn’t have done better than she had. She should have gone to the grammar school but she hadn’t been admitted; even now that realisation stung a bit. She’d told herself it didn’t matter back then; she’d always been good at sports too but only when others deigned to pick her for teams. She’d been lonely, always somehow wrong in her own skin. Phyllis had been lonely too.

Wanton.

And then they’d been sixteen and waiting for their lives to start. A husband to find and a career to holiday through until it was taken from them.

Wanton.

Phyllis had been braver than Helen even then. She’d been the one to take her hand on that fateful bus journey. She’d been the one to kiss her first, to frame those hazy wants into something solid, she’d been the one to press herself against Helen like she couldn’t bare to be parted. 

Perhaps Phyllis had been wanton then. Perhaps Helens mother was right after all. Perhaps they both had been wanton. Desperate.

And then they’d made the hasty promises all youth like to make without thinking of their consequences and they’d tried. Dear God how hard they had tried. The trying had hurt them both. A pair of bodies could hardly have tried any harder than they had and it still hadn’t been enough. The constant demands of daily life being who they were. Every day Helen had watched Phyllis fade a little more; the necessity for caution, for secrecy, for lies was the cancer that wore at them both. The love remained but only when they could permit it to show. 

Helen had still loved Phyllis though, even dog weary and bitter. Helen had always loved Phyllis. She had loved the girl at the bus stop with her smiling mouth and the woman who wept into her coat sleeves on a hotel bed at the invasion of their home. She’d loved the woman she left sleeping in that same hotel bed the next morning. She had thought then as she’d walked away that she would love Phyllis always like a scar, like a chronic sickness, a festering love that she could not shake, she could not push away, cursed in the end only to keep it always inside her. 

And, it dawned on Helen as she stood in a bright and tidy living room some thirty years later, quite removed from the marks of their youth, waiting for Phyllis to finish pottering in her neat kitchen, that she loved Phyllis still. Phyllis who was older and softer now but whose mouth could still be persuaded to smile at her the way it had before.

Helen sighed quietly, hugging her waist. 

Wanton.

Helen didn’t know if it could all possibly be quite true. If this could possibly be allowed. If some things could be caught again amongst the falling grains of time; snatched back.

Something caught her eye and held it there as she stood awkwardly in a strange place that wasn’t quite strange enough. A thin beige spine of a book, tucked away shyly and only vaguely noticeable because it was so plain in comparison to its neighbours. So plain. Helen felt her heart beat, once... Twice, as she reached to pull it free. There was no dust in the pages. The words had been read recently then.

Helen smiled down at the familiar page, the heavy setted type made dense and faded by the repeated eyes reading them over the years. Somehow they were not diminished. Helen felt her own eyes burn as she held her breath and flicked to a dog eared page. Their page. 

And it was their page. Still. Their original handwriting was still scribbled in fading pencil, side by side, nestled into the corner, their lines scored beneath the words. It was a snapshot of Before. Helen felt her hand shake, the old fragile spine rattled in sympathy as Phyllis poked her head around the corner. 

When she saw Helen holding their book her cheeks softened, she wiped her damp hands on her jeans and walked over slowly.

“You kept it.” Helen stated numbly, faintly hypnotised by Phyllis, her hand shaking even harder when Phyllis prised the pages away from her fingers gently.

“It didn’t feel right not to have it.’ Phyllis said with forced bravado. ‘I had to empty our flat anyway so I took it with me. I’ll admit at the time I didn’t think there would be another time where we’d read it together but now...” She finished quietly, her eyes on Helen, a question there Helen didn’t have an answer to.

“I can’t believe it’s still with you... I bought another for my own again later but-“ Helen trailed off. 

It hadn’t been the same. Phyllis had bought their book in a charity shop for their first anniversary together in a home of their own and they’d both enjoyed the poetry. It had been tatty and long abused even then. It had lived in their bookcase. Something that was just theirs. 

After Helen had settled alone she’d seen another copy in the local Waterstones. It lived in her office shelves to this day but she’d never quite been able to read it in the same way she had before. It had been an unwelcome twin. The magic absent. She’d not been able to even look at it some days without recalling Phyllis’s voice and that had been painful. 

Phyllis held the book now and looked down at the words. She read aloud; Her voice melodic in the quiet between them.

“Ay, the pain it costs me  
to love you as I love you!

For love of you, the air, it hurts,  
and my heart,  
and my hat, they hurt me.

Who would buy it from me,  
this ribbon I am holding,  
and this sadness of cotton,   
white, for making hankerchiefs with?

Ay, the pain it costs me  
to love you as I love you!”

Helen could not stop herself from smiling as the old words dropped around her like feathers. Something soft and theirs.

“And was it?’ Helen asked stumbling slightly on a question she was not certain should be asked. ‘Was it worth that cost?”

Phyllis closed the book slowly, her eyes unwavering as she nodded.

“I believe it was. Now and then.”

“But I left-“ Helen began solemnly, the echo of the hotel door closing behind her was still strong enough to make her wince. 

“You left and I understood.” Phyllis interrupted with a faint grimace of remembrance. 

“Did you? Did you really?” Helen whispered it, desperate to know and afraid to know all at the same time.

“I... I hated you when I woke up.’ Phyllis admitted truthfully, her face obstinate and honest to a fault. Still. ‘I called you every name I could think of; I branded you a coward and I wished I hadn’t loved you.”

“Oh.” Helen felt like she’d stumbled over a drop she’d known was coming. A drop she’d carved into the smooth surface she walked upon long before she’d considered how it might trip her up.

“Then,’ Phyllis went on gently. So gently. ‘Then I had time to consider what we had. What had been shared and it... It was hard to hate you. I know the why. I know you didn’t do it for cruelties sake and the knowing made it easier I suppose.”

“I thought I was keeping you safe. I thought I was doing what was best.” Helen watched Phyllis cautiously. She had. She had forced herself to be brave; to live without an arm in a bid to stop the cancers spread, she’d thought it was a comparable pay off for their continued freedom to live safely.

She’d not realised until it was much too late of course that this had been idiocy. She could have no more stopped being what she was or wanting what she wanted than she could turn out the moon. She had made a grave mistake and the making of it had been too well done. She had believed herself lost to Phyllis.

“I know.” Phyllis repeated as though she could see inside Helens head and pluck at the thoughts tangled inside it.

Helen could only hope that was true. Phyllis leant towards her and for a moment Helens heart leapt and she thought Phyllis intended to kiss her. Her body locked in its confusion and Helen wasn’t sure she could, she’d never- Not since their last.

Phyllis hand slipped into Helens as the book was returned carefully to its rightful place. The hand was a weight Helen clung to. It was a memory. 

Wanton.

“Shall we eat?” Phyllis enquired calmly and Helen could only nod in response. Her throat was suddenly very tight as Phyllis released her and walked back to the kitchen. Helen watched her go, studying her profile hard, noting the unmistakable changes there and the similarities, the smooth lines of her back and the widening of her middle. Helen felt her fingers dig into the side of the dress she’d foolishly bought for this evening because... Because she was shy and had wanted a cheap form of armour tonight. She thought of Patsys quip in the car.

‘Bet you shaved you legs though.’ 

And blushed with the memory because she knew she had done exactly that dammit and the truth of it made her feel like a fool now as she stood in Phyllis’s house. More unsure at 60 than she’d been at 16. She still really had no idea what was going to happen next even though Phyllis had suggested she spend the night. She wondered if Phyllis would laugh at her if she told the woman what she’d imagined. The image of mutton and lamb drifted over her brain and Helen bit her lip indecisively.

Wanton.

She wasn’t quite certain she wanted anything to happen tonight; she was very aware that she wasn’t in her thirties anymore and a tiny part of her worried Phyllis would be expecting that she still would be somehow. She was worried Phyllis would look at her and feel disappointment. She was worried Phyllis would push her away if she did anything, made any kind of move.

They ate the dinner that Phyllis had made in the kitchen where it was warm and mild. She’d obviously spent a very long time making it; vegetarian of course but still dripping with flavour. She’d been working on it all day she said; trying to make it nice but Helen would have happily eaten bread and jam with just as much contentment for the sake of the company.

They talked most of the evening; neither of them aware of the way the clocks dial turned round and round or how the kitchen grew darker around them.

Phyllis’s house was colourful; she’d travelled quite far in the end. Helen listened to her explain sprawling rivers and adventures going awry enchanted despite hersel. The missed opportunities, the recounting of stories Helen wished she’d been part of left her hollow inside. They’d lost so much time.

They talked about their lives. They talked about Home, the old days. They talked about work; Phyllis seemed proud of Helen for her achievements and Helen was flattered. They talked about Patsy too; Helen watched enchanted as Phyllis laughed until she cried at some of her favourite anecdotes. They talked about news. The weather. 

There were a few subjects they avoided however; both of them tip toeing around the obvious sore spots. They did not talk about who they had known between them and now for example. Helen didn’t have much to tell on that score anyway, she hadn’t dated; she hadn’t wanted to try again with someone new and watch it all fail again. There had only been two anonymous women she had slept with anyway and both times it had been clumsy, uncomfortable. She hadn’t known how to be herself. 

Phyllis on the other hand though had most definitely been with others in the interim even even if she was trying not to make it obvious. Helen shrewdly suspected Patsys straight laced inspector. She’d seen them talking while Patsy had been unconscious in the hospital. They hadn’t been overt but Helen knew Phyllis too well. They had stood too close and Phyllis had known her name too easily.

Phyllis probably wouldn’t even deny it if Helen asked her out right but for now Helen chose not to pursue the matter. It was fair. Helen had left and her promises had been broken; Phyllis had been at liberty to do what she wanted and with whomever she found. Even so, Helen would be lying if she said there wasn’t still a flair of jealousy there perhaps. 

They finished their food slowly, the last bites cold because they were distracted. 

Helen wanted to say something clever as scratched the point of her fork against the plate nervously. She wanted to be bold for once but nerves held her back as they drifted into a knot of tension where neither was certain quite what to do now.

They washed up side by side in the end stood propped against the draining board and sink when they realised the meal was truly finished and they couldn’t pretend otherwise any longer. They both grew quiet as they stumbled out into undiscussed territory without a defined destination. Phyllis’s hands were soapy in the bowl as Helen dried the plates with a tea towel. That didn’t feel strange at least. They must have acted out this part a hundred times over. Helen watched Phyllis hands as they dipped in and out of the water, the ripples that spread from the movement of her fingers on the bubbled strewn surface. She felt a warmth spread down her spine as she remembered doing this before. What had happened afterward.

Warm hands. Phyllis had warm hands. They had always been warm and smooth and white; a perfect opposite to Helens own, the contrast wonderfully opposed. They were still warm and white now but time had stained the knuckles with a blush of pink and the veins that threaded out to map the top of them stood higher. Proud. Encircling it all were the darker spots of age dotted here and there. 

“You look tired.” Phyllis interrupted Helens private study softly but the words might as well have been shouted because they made Helens own hands turn clumsy in surprise and she had to jerk them back quickly to catch the plate she was holding before it slipped onto the floor.

The moment smashed.

“I- Do I?” Helen was glad of her dark features then. She was glad only she could truly know her own discomfort. Phyllis cocked her head and smiled questioningly. She reached to pull at the bottom of the tea towel, suds dripping carelessly where they fell onto the floor as she dried her hands.

“It’s late.” Phyllis murmured, her eyes starting to the clock on the wall. Helen didn’t bother to mimic her; she wasn’t tired no matter what the clock said about the matter.

“Have I kept you very late?” Helen asked blankly as she felt again the hollow feeling from before. Maybe this was all this evening would be. Two old friends just as she’d told Patsy. 

Phyllis pressed her lips together, her throat moving as she swallowed. Her hands remained where they were though, bunched up around the tea towel while Helen held the other end, the two of them connected by a streak of mucky linen and half a foot of worry.

“No I-‘ Phyllis stopped, licking her lips as her hand inside the towel clenched and unclenched nervously. Helen waited without haste for her to come to the verdict; it felt like whatever Phyllis said would be her answer. ‘I’m not tired.”

“Well,’ Helen faltered, the dress hanging around her calves felt suddenly too close to her skin. A foolish effort. ‘We don’t have to go to bed yet.” Who’s bed that would be and whether they’d go alone was anyone’s guess. Phyllis swallowed hard again and dropped the tea towel to take a step backwards.

Helen felt the distance more keenly than she felt the time. She resented it.

“I feel I must say something to you.” Phyllis began in the no nonsense voice that Helen understood to mean she’d been practicing a speech in her head. She’d used to do that a lot in their twenties; chewing her words long before she could easily relinquish her hold on them.

“I’m listening.” Helen supplied with a dry note. She was listening. She was listening with a coiled sort of hope and dread. Phyllis took a deep breath and straightened her shoulders, braced for an impact.

“I believe it is important, at times such as these, to place ones cards on the tables in situations that require absolute transparency. I do not wish for my meaning, my intentions, to be in any way misconstrued.” Phyllis paused, her face pulled in somehow like her body was holding a breath that had nothing to do with its respiratory requirements.

“I wish you would.” Helen really did. She hoped Phyllis would be the brave one again. 

Wanton.

“What I’m saying....’ Phyllis sighed and took Helens hand slowly, lacing together their fingers like she wished she could keep them that way. ‘What I want to say is merely that you and I, us, I am in it for as long as you’ll have me Helen. I mean it, I’m committed, I’m all in. Patsy, the girls, everything that happens next. I want to be there. I want to be with you. So... I’m yours... if you want me.”

Helen stared at their hands. Her brain oddly empty somehow. Well... That had been somewhat easier than she’d anticipated. And still she had doubts.

“But... What if we’re not right for each other any more? What if I’m a disappointment?” 

Wanton.

A line scored the skin between Phyllis’s eyes as she tried to understand what Helen could possibly mean. She licked her lips again and Helen wanted to kiss her. She wanted to be brave.

“I shan’t press you on anything else; I... Want to wait for things to happen naturally. I’m not- I couldn’t be disappointed by you Helen, I know you.”

“You thought you knew me, that was thirty years ago Phyl.” Helen corrected stubbornly, wishing for once she could turn her brain off. Phyllis laughed and her spare hand reached to trail through the fabric of Helens dress. It rested heavily in her palm and shrouded the pale white skin. A pearl cast to sea.

“I know you Helen. I’ll always know you. How could I not? I gave you my heart and I didn’t call it back. You’re it and you’re mine. I believe we were born a pair... I don’t care about the time that’s passed, we have now.”

Helen couldn’t breathe. Simple. Why did Phyllis have to make things so simple. That couldn’t allowed surely? It couldn’t be as easy as she said it was.

But it could be.

If they tried. If Helen could just believe.

Wanton.

“I think I am tired after all.” Helen heard herself say distantly and watched Phyllis release her grip on the dress slowly. She looked vaguely disappointed; maybe she’d hoped Helen would say everything back. Helen knew she wanted to. She did love this woman but... 

Phyllis said to leave the washing up; she’d come back when she’d shown Helen to her room. The implication far too obvious that she intended to let her sleep alone.

They walked up the creaking stairs slowly and the spare room was dutifully opened from the door and admired. Helen thought it oddly blank; just a bed and few watercolours on the walls. It seemed at odds with the brightness of downstairs. The bedding looked fresh though and Helen imagined Phyllis making it conscientiously as she’d waited for Helen to arrive. 

The linen looked cool now though it might have been warm going on. Warm as Phyllis.

Helen turned to find Phyllis behind her, watching closely for approval or disdain and she knew she should say something but she couldn’t find the right words. She felt clumsy, uncoordinated and unlike herself. The whole situation was painted surreal. It shouldn’t be allowed to happen.

“Night Helen.” Phyllis whispered quietly in the half gloom. Helen thought then that this would be the moment Phyllis kissed her. She must do. After what she’d just said Helen knew this had to be the time but Phyllis didn’t. She teetered slightly on the tips of her feet, her hands folded behind her back tidily as they gazed at one another.

Helen opened her mouth to speak but the pause had grown awkward with her silence. Phyllis rocked once more and stepped back, her hand reaching for the bannister.

Helen watched the way her hair bounced as she moved, the play of light on the skin of her throat, heard the slight squeak on the floorboard from the shifting of her feet. She couldn’t let her go. She wanted to believe in this. She loved this woman to her bones.

“Is that it?’ Helen asked of Phyllis back regretfully, unable to quite stem the disappointment she felt back into its respectable shell, ‘don’t I even get a goodnight kiss?”

Phyllis froze, her outstretched hand suddenly very hard and white as she swallowed. She kept her chin low as she looked back down the hall towards Helen who stood watching her.

“Don’t you get a-“ Phyllis repeatedly shallowly, surprised. Helen didn’t waver where she stood waiting. 

“Leave the washing up maybe?” Helen suggested, feeling heat on her face and not caring.

They stood like statues for half a second and then Phyllis was pelting down the hallway far too fast, her lips cracking into a wide smile, her arms wrapping around Helens waist like they had always been there boisterously. Helen felt herself melt as Phyllis lifted her just a little and half twirled them around. 

Wanton.

Helen sighed as Phyllis bent her face to reach her lips. The electrical charge as they met made them both shake, the capture of what might be, a stilling of worries.

The kiss was a strange one, an old kiss and a new kiss wrapped together so tightly it was hard to say which held more sway. Helen had kissed these lips for years, she’d lived from the memory of these kisses. They stood in the doorway of the room and Helen was reminded irresistibly of their first kiss; grappling around in the dark even then.

Wanton.

Phyllis did not push her, she demanded no quarter that Helen could not give and this just made the giving of it all the sweeter. It was a promise and they both seemed to understand it.

Wanton.

Helen reached up to wind her fingers around the curls of Phyllis’s hair as their mouths opened for the meeting of their tongues almost coyly. Her hair was soft to the touch as it had always been. So soft. So sweet. She felt something that bad weighed heavy in her chest finally drift away. This was really possible, it was happening. They were here.

Phyllis cradled her face gently in both hands, holding Helen to her like she was worried Helen might disappear if she didn’t. The spreading of her fingertips against Helen skin was like rain drops, they made Helen feel alive to just how badly she’d missed those hands on her. These kisses. The way Phyllis placed one lighter kiss before a deeper one. The way she sighed. The way she was only ever this soft when it was just the two of them. The way she held Helen like she was precious.

Helen broke away from Phyllis’s lips to turn her head and find those fingers with her mouth, to hold them between her teeth and tease. They tasted like salt and the remnants of dish soap but Phyllis’s strangled gasp made it perfect. The gasp made Helens hips move. They made her flood against her knickers.

Wanton.

Smiling now with pleasure she wouldn’t share with anyone else Helen let the fingers fall away from her mouth after a moment with a satisfying pop. She returned to attack a startled Phyllis’s mouth once more, finding to her delight that Phyllis was still her equal. They kissed like they were drowning now. Maybe they were. Maybe they were finally breathing again although Helen could hardly breathe and her head floundered as she gave in to what she needed. Phyllis, this, she needed it all and she would have it.

Phyllis had been wearing a loose top when they’d come upstairs, the fabric a neat cotton. Practical. She wasn’t wearing it now. She wasn’t wearing her jeans either. Helen lifted it all away from Phyllis skin swiftly with trembling fingers, taking in the unmistakable changes to a landscape she had learned long ago hungrily. Phyllis was a little wider around the hips than she’d been thirty years ago perhaps, the skin at her throat was creased here and there with sun and age, the odd stains of time she couldn’t escape were evident on her breasts but she was still Phyllis. Helen didn’t care about any of it; she was blind. She relished only the fact that Phyllis was here, she was real in front of Helen. She was soft and warm and Helen loved her. She loved her.

The rather utilitarian bra designed more for comfort than looks that Phyllis wore took a moment of fumbling on Helens part to remove which made them both laugh despite themselves as Helens fingers worked to unfasten the tiny clasps. Phyllis for her part slid down the zip at the back of Helens dress. They worked slowly and yet not slowly enough, they didn’t need haste but they wanted it.

The cool air stung a bit as the dress fell onto the carpet. Helen felt her face grow crimson as she sensed how closely Phyllis gazed at her; making her own quiet audits. Helen allowed herself only a shiver of the fear she’d been holding onto as Phyllis pulled her into her arms when she was done. They were solid arms. Warm and hard and they were touching Helen reverently. Gently mapping out the curves of her hips, her spine. Soft hands.

Phyllis was soft. Hers.

They didn’t rush to the bed as they might have done once, they took time to pick up their clothes and fold them on the bedside table because whether either of them wanted to mention it the bed frame was low for ageing knees and falling over a poorly left garment right now would be a disaster they didn’t need. The kisses eased them along though, turning the wheels in motion until they were settled. Laying on the well made bed and cool sheets.

Helen didn’t wait for one of them to say something then; she was too busy re-making her own maps, her need to touch Phyllis almost stealing rational thought. She found the hollow beneath Phyllis’s collar bone and held it between her teeth until Phyllis squirmed, recalled the tiny space on the womans abdomen that tickled her and made her gasp again, revelling in the way their bodies fit together as the fear dissipated into something deeper between them. Silly really. This wasn’t scary. This was wonderful, just them like this again. 

Phyllis had never been a passive lover in any respect; she’d always been keen. Wanton. But Helen took the lead this time; her eagerness too evident as she touched Phyllis’s body. It was the old affliction resurfacing after too long a stretch of being quelled. Phyllis lips trailed along Helens shoulders, her arms. 

“I love you.” Phyllis kept saying it, the whisper a mantra that made Helens head spin as she pushed her partner to lie beneath her. The tangle of their legs, the way they slid against each other. Helen rocked gently, her body waking up from its self induced sleep as Phyllis gripped her thighs and Helen pushed against them. Feeling the spreading warmth in her belly that streaked through her blood.

She forgot the way her knees creaked when she bent them to drag her face down Phyllis chest. She only knew she loved Phyllis, only knew she had to taste her. Phyllis held her close, her arms circling Helens back as Helen found a breast and took it in her mouth just like she’d tasted Phyllis’s fingers. Just the same but different.

The flesh puckered and swelled between her lips, Phyllis’s fingers stroked her back as they undulated as one being. Slowly remembering. Slowly.

“I love you.”

Wanton.

Helen couldn’t stay slow for long, she couldn’t stop as she stroked the skin in front of her. So pretty. Freckles; how could she have forgotten all of these freckles? She’d counted them a few far flung years ago. She’d known them as well as she’d known her own face. They waited for her now like old friends as she dipped even lower and kissed them in turn. Three on one hip, four on the other. Old markers still there like chapters in a favourite book. 

She shivered as she felt Phyllis fingers on her neck. Not leading, not pushing, just touching. Connecting them. 

Someone sighed then, maybe both of them did, it was hard to hear as Helen drifted down to find her hazy goal, nudging Phyllis legs a little further apart with the point of her chin to make room for her. Phyllis obliged generously, her breaths catching in her throat with anticipation because at this point to not do so would be ridiculous. They both might die if she didn’t.

Wanton.

The hand at Helens neck tightened just a little with nerves. A tiny show of trepidation that wasn’t necessary here in this time and place. Helen gentled in wordless response. The old and the new blurring across the decades. They’d done this before; it was instinctual. Still.

Helen couldn’t stop the way her heart thumped unevenly as she looked at Phyllis laid open before her. The pale frame of her hips bracketed by Helens arms. She was still lovely, still soft. Helen pressed her lips against the velvety softness, felt the give of delicate flesh parting against her mouth, her tongue. The subtle beat of life as the blood pulled against Helens ministrations, the quickening of a pulse. 

Phyllis fingers tightened just a little on Helens neck as her hips curved upwards to meet Helen. The grasping need to be close, to feel everything was disorienting. Helen felt drunk, felt like she was drunk on the taste of Phyllis and the hold of her legs around her. The feel of softness everywhere. The heady fall of lust. She couldn’t stop, wanted to taste until she couldn’t anymore and they had time now. They had all the time left in the world.

Phyllis hands were moving, reaching between them to stroke Helens cheek reassuringly and Helen paused to kiss the tips of them lazily as they rubbed at her face. Loving. Asking without demanding. Helen smiled as she dragged her hand up to rest beneath her chin, the tip of her middle finger grazing Phyllis opening just a little. Phyllis hips moved again shakily and Helen traced the dip that marked her entrance, marvelling at the way a body could yield without force. The way Phyllis could give herself to her so eagerly after everything that they’d endured.

“I love you.” Phyllis whispered through the quiet, her fingers tightening as she sighed and let her head fall back against the mattress in surrender.

The words fell on Helens ears heavily; a spark against the touch paper of her soul. A pressing kind of declaration from a face she couldn’t see but that she knew. She knew it was true, freely given. It was her undoing and always had been. Three words and she’d give Phyllis the world. Helen closed her eyes, savouring the moment as she pushed a little more firmly against the opening of Phyllis’s vagina and felt the warmth of the situation surround her, the steadfast grip that made her stomach writhe. She wanted to fill this moment. She wanted to make love to this woman for as long as she lived. 

Phyllis breathed unevenly, her hand clutching without thought now on Helens chin, her jaw. Refusing to let go. Helen didn’t pull away, only pulled closer, closer than skin or logic. She let her hand talk plainly for her in reply; better at actions than words when it came to Phyllis. 

The silence was soft around them. The only sounds coming from them. Helen kissed and stroked and prayed for the kind of absolution only Phyllis could give her as she lost herself in the two of them.

Forgive me she said as she curled her fingers. Don’t let me go she pleaded as she ran her tongue around the swollen mass of nerves that made Phyllis shake around her lips. Don’t you know I can’t forget? Don’t you know you’re mine too? I love you. I love you. I love you too.

Helen knew when Phyllis was nearly there. Knew it by the tightening of legs around her ears, the growing limpness in the hand held at her face. Helen almost didn’t want it to happen, she wanted to make it go on for as long as they both could.

“Together. Please?” Phyllis could barely speak but her hand tugged with a force she hadn’t used as of yet and Helen was powerless to deny her. Powerless to resist anymore. Why should she anyway?

Helen sighed and did as she was bid, unwilling to be apart. She slid upwards slowly, keeping their skin pressed together as though it could stop the tension radiating out of them both, to meet Phyllis’s mouth, her hand never slowing in its thrusts. It was hard to ignore how much she liked to swallow the moans Phyllis made into her mouth. Hard to ignore how badly it ached to know this was happening, the feeling of completeness.

“I love you too.” Helen said quietly when they broke apart, her heart shaking too hard against her ribs as Phyllis’s hands reached to hold them closer together. She felt Phyllis stutter and then her arms were loosening, her thigh rising between them to forcibly create the fine necessary space to touch Helen too as she lost patience altogether in the slowness.

Wanton.

Helen knew what Phyllis meant to do and helped Phyllis’s hand find its way by lifting her hips higher. She hadn’t been aware how badly she needed to be touched in return until Phyllis demanded it. Unable to stop the sigh that drifted from her mouth as she arched her back encouragingly. She hardly needed to really; Phyllis knew what she was doing, what she wanted. She found Helen quickly, found her and didn’t pause for either of them to think. Helen had to throw her head back as she felt two fingers insinuate themselves deep inside her. Filling her almost uncomfortably as she let her body relax and adjust. Her own tempo was cut short for half a second before resuming more irregularly now as Phyllis joined in.

Between them Phyllis stole Helens free hand and clutched it tightly on the duvet as they moved in sync. Helen held her back just as fiercely, noting the way their skin almost melted into each other, their fingers entwined, the slight pleasant digging of Phyllis nails against her palms. 

Wanton.

Phyllis might have been ahead of Helen by some distance but she seemed completely committed to bridging the gap, the sweet feel of her desire was destroying Helens control, her pace frantic as they thrust and arched against each other uncaring about the sounds they made. They didn’t have to be cautious anymore.

They didn’t need to be quiet or hesitant and neither of them would have bothered anyway right now. It was too much and not enough as Phyllis pressed her forehead against Helens and kissed the tip of her nose.

Helen felt something break very suddenly, without warning, as Phyllis’s hold around her fingers quivered and she captured Phyllis lips with her own wildly, the moans flying between them just as Helens own vision blurred and thinned and she called out. Helen ground down against the welcome sensation spiralling through her belly, her legs, as their hands shook. Phyllis arched, her mouth open, her eyes squeezed tightly shut. Helen couldn’t do anything to stop it, her own fingers curled unconsciously as she came and the movement only dragged Phyllis with her.

It was like a damn breaking, shattering. Something broke inside of them both and Helen knew she couldn’t stop. She wouldn’t stop again. This was it apparently; stop the world she wanted to get on.

Phyllis panted beneath her, her lips peppering kisses over Helens face as she mumbled against her skin. Helens heart felt like it was splitting in two. Making room for another again.

When they’d finally slowed, when the room made sense, when their cooling flesh calmed down Phyllis dragged them down to lie together. Still adamant that space wasn’t required here. Helen couldn’t help but agree. She couldn’t help but appreciate the way they fit together; all curved edges and soft bones. 

Phyllis pressed her cheek to the hollow of Helens throat, her hands unable to quiet, trailing along a flash of collar bone with reverence. Helen watched her face entranced.

Wanton.

“I love you.” Helen said softly just for the sheer joy of being able to do it. Phyllis smiled laconically and looked up to meet her gaze. Her eyes unchanged. 

Wanton.

“Stay forever?” Phyllis asked a little hesitantly as though there was the smallest possibility in her mind that Helen might deny her. Helen felt her eyes mist as she reached to hold Phyllis’s hand hard over her heart. It beat the harder as if trying to hammer through her chest and fill the hand that owned it. Had always owned it.

Home finally.

“Always.”

—

Fin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well... Yeah. I wrote a little bit of smut. Catching up did ask me and I don’t like to break a promise once I make it. In deference the fact that they’re two older women I do hope that I made it as close to life as it should be. I’m told on good authority (picked a few older women’s brains on this subject in my lunch break because no one talks about sex more than ready to retire nurses) that a woman’s body never really loses its ability to have sex.
> 
> As for my take on it, well, I’ll level with you. I know smut really isn’t my best skill, I realise there are a million versions of scenes very similar to this on just this website and people who are skilled a thousand times more than me at making sex flow perfectly. I do not count myself amongst their ranks. However, I like this chapter, I like the characters and I think it’s sweet. It’s not hard core or particularly vulgar it’s just making love which I don’t think needs any bells and whistles. 
> 
> I do hope you found it palatable.
> 
> Regards
> 
> SB


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